Blaming a thoroughbred horsemen’s group for the breakdown of a deal to place state-owned Monmouth Park under private management, Gov. Chris Christie on Monday said horse racing at the Oceanport track “will disappear’’ if an agreement isn’t reached in a week.

Christie said the New Jersey Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association is “completely untrustworthy’’ and said the association’s demands led investor Morris Bailey to declare that he no longer wants to lease the track from the state.

Bailey is taking back a $5 million letter of credit he had posted as a condition to assume operations of the track, his attorney, Ronald J. Riccio, said Sunday.

“The problem is that the thoroughbred horsemen are completely untrustworthy. We had a handshake deal with the thoroughbred horsemen at 12:45 p.m. last Tuesday and then eight hours later they were calling up to demand $5 million more in purse subsides. I am no longer going to permit millionaire horsemen to take money from waiters and waitresses and police officers and teachers or the taxpayers of this state to fund their industry,’’ said Christie, adding that the NJTHA has a history of making demands “at the last minute.’’

“Check with Mr. Bailey on this stuff. That‘s why Mr. Bailey is gone. Mr. Bailey is gone because the thoroughbred horsemen are completely untrustworthy,’’ Christie said.

“If the thoroughbred horsemen want this industry to remain in New Jersey they need to come to us in the next week with a deal that works and stop extorting the taxpayers for millions of dollars in subsides for their industry,’’ the governor said.

If there’s no movement, “then we’re not going to have a deal and we won’t have a horse racing industry in this state,’’ said Christie, though he indicated that a lease at the Meadowlands Racetrack for harness racing meets is safe.

“If they want to continue to play these games, that’s their choice but they’re playing these games with the risk that their industry is going to disappear. I don’t want that result. Let me be clear. We’ve worked diligently over the last year to make sure that result doesn’t happen. I’m hopeful that in the next seven days they’ll come to their senses and they’ll understand that saving this industry is more important than lining their pockets with additional taxpayer money.’’

Ya Right KrispyKremes,has no intention and never has to save horseracing in nj, not putting any money in his or his cronies pockets, all the jobs that will be lost thanks to him..

Javagold

Dec 12 - 1:28 pm

Chris you fat liar, their industry will not disappear , they will just go somewhere else to race…..you are an idiot !

Mark

Dec 12 - 1:31 pm

So…what exactly do you disagree with in this article?

Save your political pandering and potshots for another day.

Terrier3

Dec 12 - 1:35 pm

First the teachers then the police now horsemen. Whose next?

concetta

Dec 12 - 2:53 pm

No, first Bush ordered the closing of Fort Monmouth, next Christie laying off thousands of teachers, now Christie is closing Monmouth Park!!!! Remember this…..Oceanport and N. J. residents…..remember this on November 3, 2012. How dare he….I wonder what he has up his fat sleeve!

sue

Dec 12 - 3:37 pm

to make more hardworking people unemployed in this trash nj

Bob English

Dec 12 - 1:37 pm

The Governor has no problem with putting hundreds of millions of dollars into AC to finish a privately owned hotel or to finish privately owned Xanadu but when it comes to let NJ horsetracks compete on an equal basis with those in surrounding states, that is where he puts his foot down and says no.

New Jersey stands to lose $780 million of economic impact annually, 7,000 jobs, $110 million in federal, state and local taxes, and 57,000 acres of working agricultural landscape and open space should the racetracks close.

njbchbum

Dec 12 - 1:38 pm

it takes two to tango and christie is the bully who will not compromise! let him get up off some of the atlantic city investment $ to meet the horsemen half way. or let him take some of the $ he has earmarked for corpor ate welfare tax abatements and breaks to fund the horse racing industry. losing racing at monmouth park is just another economic blow to this area of new jersey after the loss of fort monmouth and its dependant industries. gov christie does not give a hoot about monmouth county, monmouth park and the farms, trainers and breeders that are dependant on the equine industry! if he will not support them, they will not support him – and he deserves that!

Bet one of Christie’s rich developer friends want to build houses or a new mall or both on the property.

Bill Beaty Ocala, Fl.

Dec 12 - 1:58 pm

Hopefully you will end up in Fed Prison where you belong. You are the problem with selective personal cuts. Maybe you should just remove yourself from all aspects of the situation because it dosen’t put enough $ in your big fat pockets.

fedupinnj100

Dec 12 - 2:01 pm

This is the kind of attitude that will eventually sink Christie.

Danny Schick

Dec 12 - 2:14 pm

I guess the horsemen didn’t donate enough to Christie’s campaign and that of the other Republicans. How he can even try and justify giving all the money and breaks to AC and then say that the Horse Racing Industry has to make it all on their own is beyond belief. He is nothing but a bald face liar and hopefully enough people will wake up and see him for what he is, A Liar and Bully who if you you have the nerve to stand up to him, he will try and crush you. I made the mistake of voting for him the first time, never again.

christie is the best at closing , how about improving something instead. if they combined gambling with the horses it would be hard getting down the parkway, and its bull about protecting the casinos cause monmouth park was here long before the casinos and the casinos have hurt mon park

bill Hogan

Dec 12 - 2:52 pm

The horsemen and women that support thoroughbred racing are not the “millionaire” kind that Christie would like to portray. They put everything into the horse and their industry in order to have a chance at “winning” the purses that are part of horse racing. Governor, instead of trying to ignite an electorate over a class of people with rhetoric the likes of our current president, stop campaigning on a national level and settle this so Monmouth County doesn’t lose another industry like Fort Monmouth, the postal sorting area, etc. The “billionaires” you want to help would leave NJ and Atlantic City in a heartbeat. The people of Monmouth Park actually have roots here and wish to stay.

JoJo Kromer

Dec 12 - 3:36 pm

The Honorable Chris Christie, Governor of the State of New Jersey, the Garden State, has taken too much time trying to smother the fire that burns within the souls of horsemen. It is all a smokescreen…friends of the gov want the Meadowlands area (the next Mall of America) including xanadunk to themselves so that when it is all privately owned, send in the clowns to build a racino to line their own pockets. No sharing allowed…only the Christie entourage…ugly…despicable…cronyism at its height.22333

Jim in OG

Dec 12 - 3:04 pm

I don’t see any reason why even one penny of my money should go into funding this industry. If you want horse racing at Monmouth Park, pay for it yourself!

Jim hate to tell you but you have been paying for MP for years. When the state put the track up for “sale” it didn’t expect someone to want to buy. Now they are making it impossible for anyone to want it buy it. They just want to sell it to one of their cronies.

rob

Dec 12 - 7:26 pm

Yes but its o.k. then that our tax payer dollars go to keeping A.C. afloat. Most of the residents of N.J. live north of Ocean county. Perhaps the governor should also care about where the majority of the states residents reside rather than the far less populated southern part of the state.

Kevin

Dec 12 - 3:11 pm

njbchbum & others,

Umm…Maybe you should wait to see if a deal is made before you decide Christie has destroyed NJ horseracing.

Do you actually think if the horsemen demanded $5mn more he should just give it to them?

Strange approach to negotiating.

And to those posters with their “krispy kreme” comments, thanks we get it, he’s never going to be a jockey.

I don’t agree with all of his actions/inactions.

But posters with their fat taunts make it hard not to see him as the more reasonable party.

joe

Dec 12 - 3:13 pm

AS a former owner in NJ i agree completely with the Governor, these fools have ruined racing for years and it is the same old greedy self serving people that will finally bury racing!

Was Middle Class

Dec 12 - 3:19 pm

Christie excels in losing middle class jobs so that his campaign donors are rewarded. Pumping $$ to A/C hotel owners in a city so blighted you stay indoors only to be not guaranteed you’ll get out of the parking garages alive. Last year was a great year for Monmouth Park and Christie would not allow this year for the same schedule and purses. That in itself told the tale that is playing out today. He’ll let you gambled in an unsafe A/C, but would not permit it in a safe environment of Monmouth Park. He blames everyone for his failure, but himself. He has no problem going around the nation stating he is/not running and supporting the new candidate of the week. I believe we are footing that bill also. His ranting makes great media, but it is destroying the middle class as we know it as well as the entire State of New Jersey.

Frank Pizzuto

Dec 12 - 3:38 pm

The claim Christie makes about the horsemen calling up to demand $5 million more in purse subsides- IT IS A COMPLETE AND TOTAL LIE. IT DID NOT HAPPEN.
He will do anything and say anything to make the horsemen look bad. Just like he did to the unions. Throw the kitchen sink at ‘em.
The entities getting tax abatements and tax subsidies from the NJ taxpayers thru the Governor’s office are the rat-holes called Xanadu and Atlantic City.
Both places are and will continue to be monumental failures.
Hey Jon Hanson-Your report said Atlantic City could be turned around in 12 months. It is now 18 months. How are things looking?

It would be great for horse racing to end! Maybe they would just move it someplace else, but each obstacle is another step toward ending this cruel sport that kills and injures horses and sends the also-rans to slaughter.

Cynthia H

Dec 12 - 3:57 pm

Monmouth Park is has been in the state for over 100 years. This is a part of our history. Please governor do not let this happen. The casinos have been in the state since the 1970s. People get ripped off at the casinos. At MP you can bring the family and spend the entire day for a small amount of money.The horse farms and open spaces of farmland will be lost. So many jobs will be lost. It would be a crime to destroy the history of the sport. People will spend money at NY and PA instead. You can keep supporting the big wigs of the casinos what about all the little people in the state

I don’t see why NJ, or any other govt. for that matter, should be in the business of subsidizing horseracing, casino gambling or projects such as the former Xanadu. The money could be better spent hiring auditors to investigate the bridge and tunnel authorities, our legislators and the clowns who misinformed the public by omission of critical information in bond offerings, where the SCC money really went and why, medicaid fraud, retirement disability fraud or to pay down the underfunding of our govt. pension obligations. Subsidizing horse racing would be about at the bottom of my priority list for NJ govt.

Politicalpony

Mar 18 - 2:42 pm

Totally agree.As a horseman I have lived through what the state has done to hurt this industry as well the tax payers. The roll of government is not to pick winners and losers. Government doesn’t know how to create profit all they know is how to spend everyone else money and never answer for the failures. Which are many.

David

Dec 12 - 5:24 pm

I love the middle sentences. About how Christie wont let the millionaire horseman take money away from the state anymore.

At any rate, I wish this threat would go away. I mean, I wish he was replacing the threat with shutting down the track effectively YESTERDAY! So tired of the state losing money on this dump ground.

The part that eats me up is that they dropped a cool million just on a new water drainage system last year at the stable to keep the menure from getting into the regular streams, lakes, storm drains, etc.

The money this place loses is STAGGERING. but when they are done re adjusting the books every year, things “show up ” differently. Please let Oceanport and the state figure out land restrictions, and then hold an auction. NJ residents needs the land money for the general fund.

STOP THE NON-SENSE NOW! Occupied Monmouth Park has started!

watchdoggg

Dec 12 - 7:40 pm

The faster NJ loses Chrisite, the faster this state will recover.
A meglamianacal narcisstic bully.
And he THOUGHT he would be President.

wallmower

Dec 12 - 7:57 pm

If you want to save Monmouth Park, buy Todd Christie a horse

Politicalpony

Dec 13 - 8:27 am

The Horsemen are dishonest?
Lets start with Christie and the people that have been running the State Of N.J’s Government. Here is what they have done for Thoroughbred Racing for the past three decades.
In the late 70’s when the Meadowlands Sports Complex was constructed, the first thing to be completed and opened was the Race Track. Thoroughbred Racing was extremely lucrative at the time. The Horse Racing industry almost single handedly created enough revenues to finish building the rest of the Meadowlands complex “Stadium and arena”.

Over the 15 years to follow, the state systematical destroyed the Horse racing industry in NJ. First came the AC Casino’s placing themselves so deep in the back pockets of Trenton Legislature that it was impossible for the Horsemen to get anything that would be in favor of their industry, this while all they did was lose ground. At that time the Horsemen didn’t even have a lobbyist and might as well been thrown over board without a life jacket. Then they got smart, but it was already to late.
The state allowed the owner “Levy” of Atlantic City Race Course to give up all but 14 days of racing, but yet allowed him to have simulcasting of out of state racing.
The original deal with the horsemen was that if race tracks were permitted to have out of state horse racing simulcast into the state, they the horsemen would receive a small percentage of the income which would go into the purse structure. The Horsemen were also told and convinced that they would never lose any of their “LIVE” racing days. With in a matter of just two years that deal was broke between the State and the Owner of that race track and AC Race Course was permitted by the State to only be required to run 14 days per-year. This hurt the horse industry badly. Many of the South Jersey residents were forced to conduct business at the Pennsylvania race track now known as Parx Racing and “Casino”. The owner of that Race Track afterwards came in and purchased both Freehold Race way and the now non-existent but famous Garden State Park Race track in Cherry Hill. In order, and required to keep it looking honest with the requirement of racing days verse simulcasting of out of state racing, they continue to race at Freehold Raceway. But with a purse structure amounting to the 1930’s. Needless to say they found a way to not only completely destroy Garden State Race Track, but sold it to a developer for millions.

Moving into todays current situation.
For years the Racing industry has wanted to add slots to their race tracks. For years the Casino’s have been paying off the Trenton Legislature to stop that from happening. They “casino’s not the State” have even went so far as to paying off the Horse Industry through a subsidy to keep the Horsemen from forcing their hand and adding slot machine’s to the race tracks. How are the subsidies the Casino’s pay out generated? Through tax breaks the State gives to them. The Casino’s receive tax breaks from their Comp Tickets, Free drinks, free dinners and free hotel rooms to their patrons. The Casino’s write off these freebie gifts they give out. The money they save they then turn over too the Race Tracks. This, with the agreement that the Horse racing Industry will not pursue legislation in order to have their own slot machines. But all the while, NJ Casino’s have played a very big roll in the insertion of slot machines just across the river in Pennsylvania. Then these same casino’s cry how they are failing because of the “Racino’s” over in Penn. They actually have their hands way deep in the industry. But when they publicly cry foul and maneuver within the Trenton State House, they get all sorts of goodies to go their way.

I recall 20 years ago when Steve Winn wanted to build a Casino in AC. He was going to build it on the north end of the Island, away from the rest of the Casino’s. A strategic placement in order to be the first casino you arrive at from the north. Problem was, there was no good entry from the north. So the State “Peoples Tax Dollars” decided they were going to build a tunnel. But in order to do that, they also needed to take unconstitutional action with eminent domain and therefore stole private property from citizens. As I recall the state even went so far as to investing millions of dollars into the project only to have Steve Winn “before putting and investment into the project, pull out. Result, Tax dollars waisted and peoples lives destroyed.

We have now lost thousands of acres to housing development or to none income generating properties such as parks and other so called recreational facilities. All at the cost of Once Flourishing Horse farms and other farms that support the industry. Farms that once grew agriculture items such as Hay, Straw, Carrots and the list goes on. You name it, it’s gone. Horse racing until the past two decades was the second largest revenue in taxes for the state only behind Cranberry. That’s right, it even out did the Drug companies such as Johnson & Johnson. Look at the state flag, there’s a horse on it. The horse is the state animal. We might as well take the horse off and put a poker chip in it’s place. The state keeps gambling and they keep losing.

The statement that “horsemen are dishonest” by the Governor is laughable when you consider the source, a Politician. But it also reminds me of a saying we use to say as kids. Your nothing but a Big Fat Lier. Shut up and sit down Christie. You might bully some people but your threats don’t faze those of us that know the truth.

[…] Christie did indicate that a lease at the Meadowlands Racetrack for harness racing meets is safe and not impacted by the Monmouth deal. Asbury Park Press […]

Kim Jessome

Dec 13 - 12:10 pm

I can’t believe I am saying this but in this latest confrontation Christie is right.Right from the start both horsemen assoc. should have worked together to save both thorobred and standardbred racing but as usual the standardbred people have fought tooth&nail to work this unfair process out and put in place a solution to save harness racing at the meadowlands.It looked like monmouth park was going to work it out too until the horsemen smelled money and they quickly changed their tune. Thorobreds have not raced at the meadowlands for years but since simulcast money and off track money is at stake they want in. I am not on the inside of the talks but I have been to all of the gaming commissions meetings and have fought to get slots at the meadowlands faithfully just google me and read for yourselves all the effort I have put in this for not and before you get all upset at me I am on every horsemans side but this latest fiasco is going to hurt the standardbred people because our meet is to begin Jan 2 and the Gov seems to want to group both horsemen associations together, which in principal should have happened but the thorobred assoc. is wrong to want a last minute deal on something they just don’t deserve. They have hurt themselves and honestly I wouldn’t trust them either, however with this all said I believe Gov.Christie is wrong not to allow slots at the racetracks and I hope this comes back to haunt him along with other bad decisions he has made. I urge all you to not allow him to run successfully for any gov. position, he is just like the wizard of oz, he huffs & puffs and throws tantrums but when you pull back the curtain, he is the same as any other politician a crook. Come on thorobred people get it together now and they we can all regroup and fight another day.

Sue Panneta

Dec 14 - 9:51 pm

I can tell from your psot that you do care about NJ horse racing, but let’s clear up a couple of misconceptions in your post. First, the Racing Commission still (as of 2011) authorizes a thoroughbred meet at the Meadowlands, but in the spirit of compromise the thoroughbred horseman allowed those dates to be moved to Monmouth. You can check on the racing commission website regarding the dates. So the thoroughbred horseman still had the right to run at the Meadowlands, and as of June, Christie and Gural had no problem with letting them keep that right. You are correct that it’s something of value, as it gives them a stake in future simulcast or possibly (who knows) slots revenue.

You are incorrect in stating that the thoroughbred horseman don’t deserve the Meadowlands racing dates (they have them now) or that they asked for something at the last minute. Christie (probably at Gural’s insistence) took them away AT THE LAST MINUTE! The horseman are now trying, in good faith, to negotiate purse subsidies instead.

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